Introduction

Over the past three decades, scholars have transformed the study of women and gender in early modern Europe. From nearly invisible in traditional disciplines, in a very short time it has become a dynamic field that hosts professional societies, a journal, regular conferences, book series, textbooks, and courses at both the graduate and undergraduate level. ¹ Not only have these scholars produced a remarkable quantity of works, but their scholarship has refined, reconceptualized, and reoriented our understanding of both women’s and men’s experiences between 1400 and 1800.